Well known Americus citizen Rev. Bill Dupree died on June 4, 2022, at age 89.
Funeral services were held Saturday, June 11, at the First United Methodist Church of Americus. Rev. Daryl Brown officiated. Interment followed in Oak Grove Cemetery.
He was born in 1932 in the Concord community of Sumter County to Charlie and Lula Belle (Weaver) Dupree. Bill graduated from Concord School, Americus High School, and Georgia Southwestern College when it was a Junior College where Dr. Henry King Stanford was president. Later he received his Senior College degree from Asbury College in Wilmore, Kentucky and a Master’s Degree from Emory University in Atlanta.
Bill served as a pastor in the South Georgia Methodist Conference for 44 years. From 1980-1985 he was pastor of Americus First United Methodist Church. He served his first church at Bronwood near Dawson when he was 19 years old and a student at Georgia Southwestern College. The first five years of his 1998 retirement he preached in over 100 different churches including over 30 times at Rehoboth Baptist Church in Sumter County. He also served a year as interim pastor at Salem Methodist Church on Upper River Road and at his home church, Concord Methodist Church, on the highway to Buena Vista. Bill loved the ministry. He was dedicated to spreading the word of God and touched many lives throughout his ministry. He will be missed by all those who knew him.
Bill's hobbies included collecting Indian artifacts from the fields of south Georgia. He also enjoyed traveling the world and genealogy, having published a 500-page Dupree family history.
Bill and his wife Sue lived for 24 years in retirement at Magnolia Manor in Americus. They were married for 65 years until her death in 2021. They are survived by two daughters: Susan Nichols (Mike) of Brentwood, Tennessee, and Mary Lynn Matthews (Jeff) of St. George, Utah; one grandchild, Kathryn Nichols Kresse (Jonathon); and one great-grandchild, Oliver Kresse, of Antioch, Tennessee.
For those wishing to do so, memorial contributions are suggested to the League of the Good Samaritan, c/o Magnolia Manor, 2001 S. Lee St., Americus, GA 31709; or to the First United Methodist Church of Americus, 200 S. Lee St., Americus, GA 31709.
To sign our online guestbook and express your condolences to the family, please visit www.hancockfuneralhomeinc.com
Hancock Funeral Home, 427 S. Lee St., is honored to be entrusted with these arrangements for Rev. Bill Dupree.